If you missed it, Dating in the Dark is basically Blind Date but, since this is 2009, the contestants don't go home with an underwhelming camping weekend for two in Norfolk; instead they go home clutching the remnants of their shattered heart. Metaphorically speaking, at least. Because, you see, Dating in the Dark is awful. Brilliantly awful.

The premise is a simple one: people go on a series of dates in total darkness and then fall in love at the end when the lights come on, proving once and for all that some things are more important than physical beauty. It's an amalgamation of several dating shows that came before it: it takes the idea that you don't need to see someone to fall in love with them from Blind Date; the idea that it's possible to love someone from outside your usual social group from Beauty and the Geek; and the endless, slow-motion, arms-out, clumsy stumbling from the as-yet unaired dating show The Zombie Bachelorette. It also throws in one brand new ingredient: total, soul-crushing emotional rejection.

You see, Dating in the Dark isn't really a dating show at all. It's a methodical psychological dismantling, a stern lesson that you should know which rung you belong on and jolly well stay there. It achieves this by pairing up a model-grade contestant (whose attractiveness is constantly alluded to) with a more normal-looking counterpart.

The normals – in yesterday's case they were Claire and Andy; Andy's a man who, to deliberately misquote Kim Carnes, has got Evan Davis eyes – are encouraged to believe they have a genuine chance to punch above their weight, only to have their hopes obliterated at the end when their partner recoils at the sight of them and then stands them up ahead of their final, full-vision date.

In fact, that's an understatement. The normals aren't just stood up – they are taken into a room where they can actually watch their partner stand them up. That's what happened to Claire, and seeing her get rejected for what appeared to be the millionth time was heartbreaking. Andy fared slightly better – his partner agreed to go on the final date with him, although her face and body language suggested that she was only waiting for the cameras to shut off so she could brutally destroy his heart forever in private.

Dating in the Dark is about as cruel as a dating show can get, at least until someone commissions a series called Let's All Laugh At This Ugly Idiot's Minuscule Penis. It's horrible, a show that you can only really view through the gaps in your fingers. Needless to say, I'll be watching again.